The present invention relates to methods of preparing anatomical pathology specimens for study. In particular, the invention relates to methods of preparing histopathology specimens that are conducive to automated processes and more efficient storage.
The preparation of histological specimens from surgically obtained tissue generally includes fixation, dehydration, clearing, and infiltration of the specimen. Chemical fixation is often applied to prevent degradation of the specimen and allow for later long term storage. An alternative to chemical fixation is frozen section fixation in which a specimen is quickly frozen, sectioned and prepared so that evaluation of the specimen can be done in quickly, at times while the patient is still in surgery. The invention disclosed in the present application is envisioned as being most compatible with chemically fixated specimens, but may be used with frozen section samples as well.
After fixation of the specimen has been done to preserve the specimen, it may be dehydrated, cleared, and infiltrated. Because specimens will often be prepared in blocks of material and then sliced or sectioned for study, the specimens must be made sufficiently rigid to allow for sectioning. In this process, the specimen is dehydrated with application of a water miscible stripping agent such as ethanol. The ethanol is then cleared from the specimen by application of a hydrophobic clearing agent such as xylene. The specimen may then be infiltrated with a matrix material, such as paraffin wax or epoxy resin, to provide a block in which the specimen is suspended. The block may then be sectioned by a technician and the sections mounted for analysis by a pathologist.
Traditionally, prepared specimens are mounted to glass or quartz microscope slides for analysis. The slides are fragile and must be transported and stored accordingly. This requires slides to be packaged in cassettes that results in a large amount of wasted space. Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a system for high density storage of prepared histology specimens. It is a further object of the present invention to provide for an automated system for cataloging stored samples and digital images thereof to facilitate analysis of the specimens by a remotely located pathologist. It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a system of peer review of histological diagnoses provided by one or more pathologists.